


Firing at the ones who run

by Claire



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Concerned!Chris, Injured!Peter, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-20
Updated: 2014-05-20
Packaged: 2018-01-25 22:38:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1665092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claire/pseuds/Claire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Peter is injured and Chris follows him home</p>
            </blockquote>





	Firing at the ones who run

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'ed by Temaris.
> 
> Title from David Guetta's _Titanium_.
> 
> This is a double, covering both MMoM and the 'Washing' square on Kink Bingo.

The fight had been brutal. It had been harsh and bloody and Chris had thought too many times during it that they weren't all going to make it out to the other side. He'd never been so glad to be wrong.

The entire pack had headed back to Derek's loft, beaten and bloody and wanting nothing more than to make sure each of them was okay.

Chris is the last one to get to the loft, having stayed behind to burn the bodies. Melissa is already working on Cora when he gets there, her hand reaching out for bandages and sterile strips and a few things Chris can't identify by just looking at them from the scattered piles on the table.

Cora hisses as Melissa presses a bandage to her side, and Scott reaches out, laying a hand on the back of her neck. Black lines start to wind their way up Scott's arm and the look Cora gives him is full of gratitude.

Chris looks around the loft, the couches already taken up and each person touching at least one other member of the pack. Which makes sense, for the wolves especially.

Gerard used to drill it into his head. Wolves heal quicker with their pack around them, heal quicker with the pack energy surrounding them. Chris can hear his father's voice in his head. If you have an injured wolf, under no circumstances let them get back to their pack. He wonders what Gerard would say if he saw Chris now. Wonders what he would say if he saw Allison, if he saw the granddaughter he believed had so much promise running her hand through a werewolf's hair to soothe them.

Cora limps over to one of the couches, all but collapsing next to Lydia, as Melissa waves Isaac over and tells him to sit down.

All of the wolves had fought hard, and none of them had been unscathed, especially--

"Where's Peter?" Because Chris can't see him, and he knows the wolf didn't walk away uninjured. He'd watched as the hydra's claws went straight into Peter's side, watched as Peter had taken it in order to give Chris time to reload his guns.

"Gone," Derek answers, holding the gauze Stiles handed him to the gash in his side, the gash that was only now starting to heal.

"Gone?" Because that makes no sense. Peter was _injured_ , Chris saw it. Why the hell would he leave the comfort of his pack?

"Peter never--" Stiles trails off, glancing back at Derek before meeting Chris' eyes. "He never stays."

Chris looks over at Melissa. "Did he at least get patched up before he left?"

Melissa shakes her head, not looking up from where she's stitching Isaac back together. "He never said he was injured."

Derek's entire body is stiff when Chris looks back at him, frown across the wolf's face, and part of Chris wants to ask why none of the wolves smelled it, why none of them noticed the hydra had taken a swipe across Peter's side. But he doesn't. He knows with the amount of blood on all of them they probably hadn't even realised, especially if Peter hadn't wanted them to know.

Chris grabs his jacket from where he'd placed it over the back of the couch. He doesn't need to look back to see the glances being thrown in his direction, doesn't need to hear the murmurs to know they're wondering exactly when Chris started caring if Peter was injured or not. And, hell, if someone had told him a couple of years ago that he'd be this concerned about Peter fucking Hale, he'd have called them crazy. Called them crazy for thinking there would be anything between him and Peter beyond disdain and anger and the memory of skin against skin. But it's been a long couple of years, and maybe it's time to put a lot of things to rest. Maybe it's time to see if there's actually something salvageable, apart from subtle glances and the want to reach out and touch.

It takes Chris about 20 minutes to get to Peter's apartment block. The traffic is non-existent at 2:00am, and the only other living thing Chris sees is a fox crossing one of the streets. Peter's never actually told Chris where he lives, but Chris had made sure to find out. He's pretty sure Peter knows that he knows, pretty sure the wolf doesn't actually care enough about Chris knowing to want to move. He's not sure if that says something about Peter's frame of mind, or that the wolf isn't completely ignoring their shared history, no matter how much he may try.

He knows that he and Allison are part of the Hale-McCall pack (and isn't that a kicker, two wolf hunters part of a wolf pack), but he thinks that this show of trust by Peter may be the biggest tell of all. And part of him wonders if it's because it's him, because Peter still thinks of him as _Chris_ as opposed to _hunter_.

The apartment block has a door buzzer, but Chris has lock picks, and he's in within seconds. There's a streak of blood on the wall next to the stairs, and Chris takes them two at a time until he's on the second floor, until he's standing outside Peter's door.

He doesn't bother knocking, just picks the lock again, and walks in.

"Peter?" Because he may have just technically broken in, but even Chris isn't stupid enough to sneak into an injured werewolf's den without letting them know he's there.

"Chris?"

Chris follows Peter's voice through to the bathroom. Follows it through to where Peter is sitting on the edge of the bath, his ruined shirt on the floor and pink-tinged water flowing down the drain.

"Jesus, Peter--" Chris hadn't realised it was as bad as it is, hadn't seen it fully, between the dark of the night and Peter keeping his jacket wrapped around himself. And how the hell did any of the wolves miss this? Missing a scratch Chris could understand, but this?

"It's not as bad as it looks." Peter drops the blood-soaked towel he's been holding into the bath, wincing as he reaches out for a clean one.

"Well, that's okay then, because it looks fucking terrible." It looks like the hydra claws didn't just swipe through Peter, but managed to take actual chunks out of Peter's flesh.

Peter shifts slightly, biting off the noise that's trying to make it out of his lips. The clean towel he's had next to his body for only a couple of minutes is already soaked through with red. He looks up at Chris. "Can you pass me another towel," he asks, nodding towards the cupboard Chris is standing next to.

Chris turns away, hearing the wet splat of the towel Peter had been holding hitting the bottom of the bath. He pulls out a couple of clean towels, soft and fluffy and obviously expensive. And Chris wonders if Peter would have gone for such niceties if he'd known he was going to be using them to mop up blood.

Dropping the towels onto the floor, Chris shrugs off his leather jacket, tossing out into the passage to lie where it lands. There's water in the sink, but it's already looking redder than it should, so Chris lets it drain and runs some more before soaking one of the towels in it. Kneeling down, he reaches out carefully, gently feeling the too hot skin around Peter's side.

"If I'd known this was all it took to get you back on your knees for me, Argent, I'd have thrown myself in front of a hydra months ago."

"Shut up, Peter." Chris wrings out the towel, carefully wiping the blood from around the worst claw wound, unable to stop the sympathetic wince when Peter hisses. The skin is torn, ragged, and only just starting to knit back together.

"Why didn't you stay at Derek's loft?" Because if he had, he still wouldn't be healed but he'd probably be looking a hell of lot better than he is now.

Peter just looks at him. "I prefer to lick my wounds in private. Surely you remember that."

Chris does remember. He remembers Peter vanishing for days after Chris had told him they were leaving Beacon Hills, that his mom had finally persuaded Gerard that the Hales weren't a threat to be taken down. Remembers the look in Peter's eyes when he'd suggested Chris could stay, could be part of the Hale pack, that Talia would accept him if Peter explained everything to her. Remembers the reaction when Chris had refused, had told Peter that he was a _hunter_ , what place could he possibly have in a wolf pack.

(Chris thinks that if he met his teenage self now, the younger him would be a combination of horrified, amused and impressed that that's exactly where he ended up, anyway.)

But even if Peter prefers to crawl into a dark hole and keep to himself, prefers to never show weakness, even he has to accept that he would heal quicker with his pack around him.

"The pack--"

The soft snort from Peter cuts him off. "I haven't had a pack in a very long time, Christopher. Your sister saw to that."

The towel in Chris' hand is more red than not, so he throws it into the bath to join the others and reaches out for a new clean one.

"If they're not your pack, then what are they?" Because Chris wants to know. Wants to know why Peter stays if that's how he truly feels, why he fights by their side, why he offers commentary and advice (albeit wrapped in cynical sarcasm).

There's a pause, and Chris thinks that Peter isn't going answer, thinks he's going to ignore Chris' question completely, until--

"They're a nephew who hates me, a niece who loves her brother and a bunch of teenagers who succeeded in killing me." Peter's voice is low as he answers, meeting Chris' gaze briefly before glancing away, like he's said too much, given voice to too many things. "There's just enough of a pack bond to keep me from being an omega. Nothing more."

There's an underlying tone to Peter's words, and Chris can't tell if it's bitterness or weariness. He kind of thinks it's a little of both, clinging to Peter like ash. Kind of thinks he wants to hold Peter's face in his hands and brush it away with his thumb.

He's not ashamed to admit that he still thinks about Peter, about how they were when they first met. Full of passion and fire and ready to take on the world. Not ashamed to admit that he lies in bed at night, fingers wrapped around himself, and wonders what Peter would do if Chris just reached out for him. He wonders if Peter would reach back, wonders if there's a chance for the two of them, or if it's all been buried under too much blood and smoke.

"You never used to be like this, Peter. Never used to be so," Chris pauses, a dozen words running through his head, "closed."

"What I used to be, Chris, is a stupid naive child who thought he could challenge the status quo and win. Believe me, that naiveté was soon burned out of me."

Peter reaches down and wraps his fingers around Chris' wrist, around the wrist of the hand holding the towel to his side. And Chris thinks that Peter means to pull his hand away, thinks that he means to do anything except just hold Chris' wrist, his thumb over Chris' pulse.

Chris looks at Peter, slow and carefully, feeling more like the man in front of him is a cat he doesn't want to spook, as opposed to a werewolf whose had blood on his hands. Peter's eyes are fixed on where his fingers are touching Chris, and it's not until Chris raises his free hand and cups Peter's cheek that Peter finally lifts his eyes to meet Chris' gaze.

Blue eyes look back at him, and Chris remembers the spark that used to be in them, fierce and carefree. Remembers how Peter's eyes would flash gold when he pressed his lips to Chris', when his tongue darted out to taste Chris' skin.

Chris isn't sure if what he's about to do is monumentally stupid or not, but he's going to do it anyway. (And he's stood in front of a pack of feral wolves before with only two guns and a knife, and it still felt less like throwing himself off a cliff than this does.)

He moves slowly, telegraphing his intent in every motion as he leans forward. Peter's lips are as soft as Chris recalls, but Peter's stock still, not moving, and Chris is starting to think that he's made possibly the biggest mistake he could have.

He's about to pull away, about to work out how he can possibly salvage this, when there's an exhale of breath against his lips, a soft noise coming from low in Peter's throat and Peter's kissing him back.

It's only when Peter moves forward suddenly, moves and hisses into the kiss that Chris pulls back. Peter's side is looking a lot better than it had, but the wound is still raw, angry and red in a way that suggests the painful kind of healing.

"We should go to bed," Chris says, not needing to check his watch to know it's gone past late and has settled into the early hours of the night where dawn isn't too far away.

Peter smirks, the action softened by the smile it's competing with. "Why, Christopher, and on a first date? I'll have you know I'm not that kind of girl."

Even though Chris knows that he is, knows it intimately, with the scent of the Preserve surrounding them and the memory of Peter on his knees in front of him. But a long time has passed since then, a lot of things changed.

"To sleep, Peter," he replies. "Just to sleep." Because it's been a bastard of a day, and if Chris is feeling like he's three steps away from collapsing, then god knows how Peter feels.

Chris pushes himself to his feet, dropping the towel into the bath with the others and wondering if Peter is just going to get rid of them all, as he's pretty sure they're past the point of redemption, too much of Peter's blood soaked into them.

He reaches a hand out, holding it in the air for long moments, before Peter takes it, tangling their fingers together in a way that feels right.

Peter is quiet as Chris leads him through to the bedroom, quiet as Chris opens his jeans and pushes them down Peter's legs so he can step out of them.

Chris kicks his boots off and strips off his own clothes as Peter settles on the bed, leaving him in just his boxers. Climbing into the bed behind Peter, he wraps his arm around the wolf, carefully avoiding the still healing claw marks.

Peter shifts slightly, pressing back into Chris' hold. And it feels good having Peter in his arms again, it feels _right_. He presses a kiss to the back of Peter's shoulder, waiting as the wolf's breath evens out into sleep. Peter's face looks younger when he sleeps, calm and relaxed, and Chris can't help but think about the history between the two of them, and the insistence Peter has that he's not part of the pack.

Chris thinks he's wrong. Because he's seen the way Derek glances at Peter when Peter's not looking, like he wants his uncle back but isn't sure how to make the first move. Only he knows Peter will never make that move, knows Peter too well to ever think he'll risk the outright rejection he believes will come. So maybe Chris will make that move for them. And bringing the Hale family back together will in no way make up for Kate tearing them apart, but it's a start.

Settling back onto the ridiculously comfortable pillows in Peter's bed, Chris closes his eyes. He's tired and it's late, but he has Peter back in his arms, and that's more than he started out with that day. Everything else, Chris thinks as he feels sleep start to overtake him, can be handled in the morning.


End file.
